May 22, 2011
That second day was our transit to Ko Phi Phi, and I hate to say it didn’t make a great first impression on me. I’m not one for a high season touristy destinations in the first place and PP Island is nothing but a tourist destination. We’d originally agreed to go there because we wanted to spend some time on an island and didn’t have a particular preference while my friend did. It was gorgeous but now we know!
We also got there on a Sunday late afternoon, almost everyone was smoking, we were surrounded by “helpful” hawkers of rides and hotels and my immediate reaction was “Get me OUT of here.” Being hot, tired, hungry, claustrophobic and choking on smoke tends to do that. So we got, and ended up trekking to the back of beyond to the other bay and found ourselves in a hilariously dank, horrid, hole in the side of the mountain room for the night for 1000 Baht. We immediately started planning our escape for the next morning.
My friends were due in the next afternoon so we were out of that room like a shot, after taking a few photos of PP Good View’s crap rooms: my good friend Millipede that hung out on the wall half the night with me so that I stayed awake watching him starting at 4 am, the cracked, stained, holey office ceiling tiles, the neon green bed skirts, the nauseating salmon pink walls, the other creepy crawlers that came in the middle of the night. We missed photographing the towels that served as our blankets, but there will always be the lovely sliding glass doors that couldn’t lock from the inside but COULD be padlocked from the outside. Readers, friends, compatriots, don’t ever stay at PP Good View. I don’t care how frugally you wish to travel, it’s a death trap.
Ahoy Boat! (Us, getting out)
You bet your belly buttons we picked a much nicer hotel after that (like it was hard to improve on that, a benefit of staying in a dungeon) and bedanished to my dear friend’s requested per night budget of $15/night. Yes, I was (over)reacting a little but PP Good View was what you got for that much, or you could stay in town at the dorm rooms for half again that price but “in town” = in the heart of the partying and I’m just too old for that.
Out of respect for my friend’s budget, the fact that she’s been on the road for months and doesn’t have income, though, I was up front with her as soon as she was off the ferry about the fact that the hotel was twice the rate she’d asked me to find and verified that we could a) try again to find another place closer to her budget or b) the three of us were willing to chip in and make up part of the difference if it was too much of a hardship.
I felt like that was fair to all parties. PiC had oked the offer and our other friend agreed that she would much rather stay at a nicer place and pay more to cover a share for budget traveler friend than go too bare bones for health reasons. Friend 1 waited until she got in to pass judgment but being upfront about the money and having options removed any tension from the situation. All were happy with it in the end and paid in full without any reservations.
Our stay at the Paradise Pearl was more expensive than I preferred, but we did get the rate without breakfast buffet included. They would have tacked on an extra 1000 baht per room if you booked online, which works out to approximately $35/day/room, but booking in person they offered me the non-buffet included price and called it a “discount”. That’s not a discount, it’s just the removal of a double-the-price buffet – they charged 250 baht per person if you just paid separately for the buffet. I couldn’t get them to give me a real discount for a week-long stay, but not being forced into an upsell was better than nothing. The rooms were quite comfortable with water, coffee, tea, towels, real linens, and you could pay for internet (so I was only online for a few minutes for the entire week!).
You couldn’t get away from the cursed mosquitos, inside or out, wherever you were. Housekeeping left the front and side doors wide open to invite all the wildlife in. There weren’t mosquito nets and we’d totally forgotten to bring citronella candles/lamps or mosquito coils. I was about to start hunting geckos to keep in our room in hopes they’d eat more of the dratted things! Our dinners were open air affairs too, sitting by the beach nearly every night with the sea spray under the trees, and we were both diners and dinners. Ahh yes, the wonders of the tropics! 😉 I laugh now but we were pretty grumpy about taking on likenesses of smallpox victims. Not exactly a bad tradeoff for these views, and waters, though:
Speaking of island wildlife, the cicadas and cats were unbelievable. You couldn’t hear the ocean for the din of the cicadas. They were deafeningly loud, like construction going on just overhead in the canopies in some areas. It soon became part of the aural landscape but I liked that, at first, it was a bit humbling to be so surrounded by nature as we so rarely are in our walls, concrete and manmade material cities.
You couldn’t go anywhere in the island without tripping over a cat and they were not shy about inviting themselves into the empty seats at your tables. Some especially audacious specimens invited themselves onto knees, and once right into my lap! I don’t share my expensive, very delicious, crab, so kitty was unceremoniously dumped off. (Bitter kitty went on to destroy a cicada so I felt a little guilty…)
Not one of the more forward ones, just a cute momma and her baby
The hours trickled by slowly, as we trekked from hotel to town, to the viewpoint, through the woods and along the coves, boating around some of the islands and bobbed about in the almost unnaturally clear waters. Our days, though, as ever, just melted away. I wore my wristwatch during most of the trip but didn’t bother to figure the time difference. The latter mainly because I had been too lazy to ask the difference in the first place, and then to do the math. I acquired an odd distaste for time differences so I wouldn’t bother.
May 18, 2011
Some of the fun numbers
14 days. 8 flights. 2 ferries. 5 hotels. 2 dozen longtail boats. 5 taxis. 7 tuk tuks. 1 elephant.
We’re back!
And I’m covered in at least 68 mosquito bites, 4 of which turned zombie on me (blisters, gross. That’s never happened before. Thank goodness for our home-grown emergency kit.) Nasty little buggers; I’d forgotten that I might be a tasty morsel. I thought that no one would recognize me when I got back, I haven’t gotten this much sun in a year and a half. I’m like a well-baked gingerbread with the *worst* tan lines. (I’m competing for the Worst Bride Ever Prize; I’m not even going to try to do anything about them before the wedding.)
The journey was something to remember – we flew Cathay Pacific and as @c_vandoorn warned me, the “shell” shaped seats weren’t the most comfortable, ergonomically speaking. But the way to my heart is via food and access/entertainment which they had in plenty. They fed us multiple times so our travel snacks were unnecessary, offering both regular meals that were edible and kind of tasty, as well as snacks on request. Cup o’noodles! The new seats now have outlets at every seat which is totally awesome for someone who carries more than one electronic device and needs to work… which I realize makes me sound a bit like a junkie. I need my electricity, ok?? Annnyway.
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| On the flight over, I read in the WSJ that the reason McDonald’s is doing well is because of their regional offerings. “Interesting!” I thought. In Hong Kong, I changed my mind. Because Broccoli Pie? ERM…. |
We spent an impromptu night in Phuket; after three flights starting at 10 pm Friday night and ending midafternoon in Phuket’s Saturday we (I) just couldn’t bear to proceed on to the islands as planned. PiC could probably have done it but I’m learning to call it quits before permanent damage is done. And since we weren’t already committed to any lodgings in Phi Phi, we just called a hotel from the airport and settled in for the night. Imagine: Ms Type A Traveler going International without all the plans set. *smh*
Dinner that night was at Raya Restaurant in Phuket. Increible! Their crab curry demolished my taste buds but it was worth it for the abundance of crab chunks in the curry. There was probably more crab than curry sauce, if you’d believe that. It was a pricey dinner for the budget I was projecting but the food was a-ma-zing.
Our chicken and rice lunch the following day was even more incredible. I’d found a list of local places to eat online and we wandered down streets following the map with no street names as best we could, hoping for the best because we couldn’t read a lick of Thai anyway. My navigation plan was essentially based on landmarks and hoping I’d recognize the restaurant front from the 1” by 2” photo posted on the website. It worked and for a mere 50 Baht (a jingle under $2) each, we feasted on a combination of chicken, roast and crispy pork over rice with chicken broth and a variety of soy, sweet soy and spicy sauces, accompanied by cucumber and other greens. Basically it’s the Thai version of Hainan chicken. We were struck dumb, it was so good.
Soooo we’ve found our wedding caterer…. 🙂
How to get those delectably fresh ingredients over here?
April 11, 2011
Every trip I take, I agonize over the ideal travel wallet scenario. Unless it’s within the tri-state area, my regular wallet doesn’t come with me, but I’ve yet to find the go-to alternate player.
My previous choices have been: a small two-sided folding cloth wallet, a slim zippered make-up bag, a small coin purse.
The cloth wallet can’t hold change or a passport; the make-up bag has held money, change, and some other useful items so it just becomes a clunker of a thing but doesn’t hold my passport; and the coin purse can’t hold enough of anything but cash and coins.
I’d like the wallet to have the capacity to hold cash, cards, change, possibly a passport if necessary (in some countries I won’t want to have it in there).
After reading through the lively comments in Traveling Earl’s post on this topic, it gave me a new idea.
I’ll adopt a two-part tactic for our upcoming trip which will be a bit more in-the-rough than my average business trip. I have a wallet that wouldn’t bother me to lose so I’ll use that to keep small amounts of daily spending cash; then keep some back-up cash….somewhere……
Of course, since I always carry a cross-body bag in the less natural parts (non-beach areas), it’s not as much of a concern as it is for the menfolk. Not really sure what the protocol is for beach days and how to properly lock up our stuff in hotel rooms as we’re not going to be staying in any high end places. I don’t feel comfortable leaving anything of value in our rooms but I don’t want to be lugging all our valuables like a netbook or camera with us to the beach either.
What’d ye ken? Have you any thoughts, suggestions or go-tos?
{————Carnival————}
My thanks …..
March 8, 2011
Heave a sigh of relief with me, my friends, SDCC travel planning is complete.
In a remarkably backwards approach, I’ve finalized the last part of our plans for Comic Con by booking the departing flights.
Stage 1: PiC was good enough to oversee the hotel booking after my annual overture produced bad news. We discussed the parameters: the budget, how far I was willing to be located from the Convention Center, shared the news with our lodgings companions and verified that it was in line with their budgets.
Result: We have a place to stay. We’ll be kicking in grocery money to my beloved once and always host family for dinners with them.
Stage 2: PiC arranged the return flights which had to be paid for in cash rather than award flights, unfortunately, since they were hard to come by. Everyone and their cousins and their cousins are flying out on Southwest that same day, it seems. I should have gotten on that sooner. Next year.
Result: We will be able to come home.
Insert some naggery for days to be requested off, drivers designated, and flights to be booked to Travel Companions. Because it’s not Con unless I’m driving someone crazy-bemused with my planning six months out.
Stage 3: I revived those expired Southwest award flight credits for a lovely $50 and paid another $5 to actually book the outbound flights. I’m heading out as early as I can stand to be upright. More calls were made to verify pick ups.
Result: We will be going to Con. CON!!
Now, it’s time to eagerly await programming so I can highlight all the Must See panels, the special eventing and the floor plan. I can’t wait!!
March 5, 2011
PiC and I are going on our first honest to goodness vacation this spring. It may or may not coincide with ye olde Springe Breake. Having never been on one, I wouldn’t know what a real one comprises but this isn’t a plan to cram several years of drunken debauchery into one hoopla filled trip. Though you never know what might happen …. 😉
This whole plan was born of a whim – a friend of mine has embarked on a multi-month, multi-country work and travel adventure and suggested we join her on some part of it. Preferably, hint hint, on the parts where I could be of use by translating, hint hint NUDGE.
I’m still rubbing my side bruise.
Cue a lot of chatter about why we probably shouldn’t go over: Are we serious about this because if we go overseas, that costs money and takes time and I can’t imagine taking a 15+ hour flight each way to stay for only a week…? And then, uh, are we paying for a trip and a wedding-thing-of-some-variety in the same year? How can I take time off from work I have so much to do?? You know, all the sensible stuff.
At the end of all of it: we decided to go.
When are we next going to get the opportunity to meet up with a good friend in a random country just to explore, eat and adventure? How much longer can I work at this pace without an enforced break? PiC likes long flights. We so frequently do things for each other: me for his sports and him for my geekery but never make time for a shared interest. So really, why not? We’ve never gone on a vacation together and this would be fun! (D’ya hear that, cerebral cortex? Can you access what that means?) And the wedding may or may not happen this year.
For all my naysaying above, (you knew that was me, didn’t you?) on the off chance that we might decide to go, I’ve been hoarding any windfall money and all my vacation time so we won’t be running up any debt and the time off will be covered.
From the list of probable stops Friend scribbled on the napkin six months ago, we negotiated Must Sees and Nah, I’m Not That Interesteds against the calendar and ended up with our compromise destination. PiC was strongly in favor, and though Thailand was never on my list of Must See countries (no reason), it’s not on my list of Not in This Life so that’s where we will be headed for nearly two weeks!
What do you think? Have you ever been? Any recommendations or suggestions if you have been?
February 8, 2011
In nearly ten years of attending Comic Con, I’ve always been a budget traveler.
I was lucky that it was a relatively local event, because it was easier to keep costs down. I started out volunteering in order to get free admission to the first few conventions, and rarely ever bought anything unless it was a gift. Even then I was on a strict budget. The experience was souvenir enough for me.
The biggest expenses were lodgings, parking and food with lodgings ranging from $100 per night to an insane $500 per night at some of the premium hotels. If my friend’s family hadn’t generously hosted me every year in San Diego, six or seven years running, I could never have justified those early years as a broke college student. To avoid paying ten dollars parking every day, sometimes I would park way out on a dusty road, near the railroad crossing and just off the highway to trek almost a mile in.
At first it was just me geeking out alone, save for friend’s younger sibling who was entrusted to my care a couple days of the convention. A few years later, my friend C eventually started attending too, then other siblings, the odd cousin and friend joined the stream toward the Convention Center and suddenly we were a proper group with schedules and everything.
Every year I’d drive down and spend a couple hours in the early afternoon with C’s parents, then I’d be off to pick up my badge from the convention center for Preview Night, sometimes with C’s sib, sometimes without. C would show up with his SO whenever he pleased, and we’d convene on the Con floor. That night, we’d have a post-Preview Night rehash over dinner at the house.
Every morning we’d pack our lunches from the supplies that C’s parents had more than generously laid in for us, and every night we’d meet back for dinner and banter.
Even when I started bringing PiC and a friend or two of my own, and there wasn’t enough room for everyone even to camp out so we branched out into another set of lodgings, also generously loaned to us for a stay, we always came back after a long day at Con. Not for us the after parties, the Gaslamp gatherings, home was where we headed. It’s what you do. It’s what we did.
It’s not quite the same now, C’s dad is gone and we miss him terribly. He was never a demonstrative man but he had a hug, hello or goodbye, for me in the later years; a sign, I think, that we’d become more than just kids who showed up to invade his house once a season.
This year’s going to be even more different.
We have to fly, now, of course. That’s kind of a pain – I can’t linger for the last gasps of Con anymore as I have to join the sad departing hordes to the airport.
A friend of the heart from the ‘nets will be coming out to join our group and I really hope she feels just as comfortable with the group as the other additions have become. And we don’t have our lovely loan of a condo this year so I’m scrambling a bit to find ourselves a new set of lodgings.
This last, while I never take the loan of the lodgings for granted, caught me by surprise and PiC and I have to figure out how to lodge our newly formed group. Wish me luck, I’ve run out of any decent number of hotel points, and paying for hotels in San Diego around one of the biggest comic conventions ever is rather intimidatingly expensive.
January 6, 2011
We rang in the new year driving down the highway counting down about ten seconds off the real time. But never mind that, onward!
Savings
I’m looking at three specific areas to save money in January:
1. Cell phones – consolidating my parents and PiC and myself onto one family plan
2. Cable/internet/landline – PiC’s promotional rate for all three services has expired and he’s now happy to let me reduce to the most basic or do without some services. I’m considering the options, though my heart is sad to consider options that don’t include BBC. Alas.
3. Insurance – I’ve been carrying a variety of insurance policies and he and I need to take a closer look at whether we’re overlapping or if we can consolidate for better rates at some point. This is mostly planning, I’m in favor of getting an umbrella policy if we end up combining finances and y’know, marrying it up this year.
Income
1. There’s bonus talk in the air this year, based on last year’s performance, and I had intended to put it toward a big fat trip this spring but as it turns out, that might not really take the form we once imagined. (That bit goes under spending, doesn’t it?)
2. My first year comes to an end this spring and I’ll be up for a review. I fully expect to make a strong case for a raise since my six month review was entirely positive but I’m not sure that the organization tends to be generous on either front (raise or bonus) in comparison to previous years and employers.
Investing
1. PiC and I will be sitting down to evaluate his investment strategies for age and goal appropriateness.
2. My trading account has been dormant, accumulating bits of dividends, and it’d be nice to have a few more income-earning stocks. Time for more research!
Spending
1. Travel will take a chunk of money, depending where we go, and if we count honeymooning in there, that’s another chunk. Then again, honeymooning might happen next year.
2. There’s the small matter of a wedding. I’ve got no plans other than to keep it as simple as possible.
What are your plans this year?
